


A Dream and Fruitless Vision

by likeadeuce



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-17
Updated: 2009-12-17
Packaged: 2017-10-04 12:04:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likeadeuce/pseuds/likeadeuce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wesley reflects on the women in his life, up to mid-Season 3</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Dream and Fruitless Vision

Wesley didn't have a single sexual fantasy about Cordelia Chase. He would have had a hard time persuading anyone of this fact, if he were the kind of man who talked about such things. (He wasn't). As long as the two had known each other, as closely as they had worked together, as beautiful as she undeniably was, Wes had never allowed his thoughts to take a leisurely detour through the many what-ifs that their friendship and proximity suggested.

In reality, their physical closeness and personal intimacy were exactly the reasons that Wesley never indulged such thoughts. He might, on occasion, see her in one of the low-neck, high midriff tops she favored and flash to the question of whether she was wearing anything underneath. Or, noticing the tattoo on her lower back as she bent over a file, his mind might stray so far as to wonder whether she had any others, or where they might be. But that was as far as he allowed his thoughts to go. When he first knew her, she was a student and of course an utterly inappropriate object of affection, and so he simply didn't allow himself to think about it – a major reason, most likely, that their first embrace had taken him utterly by surprise (even though he had probably started it) and ended up in such disaster.

After that day in the library, he scolded himself and swore never again, because he should have learned that lesson long before. If you had to work beside someone, you just didn't think of them that way. You didn't let yourself. Full-on fantasies, the kind that kept a man warm in bed alone, the kind that got him hard when he needed to focus his full attention on something that didn't potentially involve the destruction of the world, were best nurtured from a distance. A film star, or a picture in a clothing catalog, or the memory of Cecily Beasley-Hargrove raising her chin the fraction of an inch, and brushing her hair out of her eyes to not-quite-smile at him as he walked onto the terrace in front of her dormitory, and his heart literally speeding up as he thought _Oh God, she's going to say yes._ (Always this moment, remembered, not taking her virginity half an hour later. Not the sex, which was messy and cramped and self-conscious, had him wondering if the whole hall could hear them in spite of Mark Knopfler crooning on the tape player, ended with Cici groaning, "Bugger, Wes, this was a bad idea, why'd you let me do this?")

No, a man should stick with daydreams that were far away, or long over, or absolutely impossible. It was that much easier to work every day with his friends.

He made an exception for Fred. He made far too many exceptions for Fred, although he didn't realize this until it was far too late. She started out the same as the others (pretty girl, but -) if his mind ever started to stray toward thinking of her _that way_, he ran into a brick wall (sick girl, crazy girl, victim girl, how could you think that about her, what's wrong with you?) and his hand wandered toward the phone to call Virginia Bryce and find out if she missed him (at first, she did, as she proved over a whiskey-soaked evening of nostalgia-sex; but once the months of occasional nostalgia-sex threatened to outnumber the months of actual relationship, she didn't miss him nearly as often, and after a while, she stopped answering, and he stopped ringing up).

But then, that night at Caritas . . . Fred stood in front of a room full of men with guns, and Wes thought again (pretty girl, crazy girl, before his eyes becoming strong girl, clever girl, brave girl). And they let her go and she came to him, leaned her tall strong body against his body, and he held his arm around her (crazy girl, brave girl) and he held her not because she needed him to, but because he could (_handsome man, saved me from the monsters_). And then Wesley had to give Charles a good dressing-down, not because he wanted to (he trusted Charles, needed Charles; Charles was supposed to be the one who _didn't_ go away, the one Wesley _didn't_ have to worry about) but because they had put Wesley in charge(a Watcher places no personal goal, desire, or aspiration above the well-being of his charges, but focuses his whole energies on securing the welfare of those charges, always excepting the requirements of his sacred duties). Still, it relieved him when that was over, and he turned back to Fred and saw her smile (_I have seen a most rare vision_) and he waited for that brick wall (pretty girl, smart girl, brave girl, strong girl) And he waited. . .and he waited. . .

_When they next wake, all this derision  
Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision_  
-Oberon, _Midsummer Night's Dream_


End file.
